The mission of Child’s Voice school is to empower children with hearing loss to be successful in educational and social settings. The school offers a full-day program for children ages 3-8 years old who move between small and large group classrooms and focus on literacy, vocabulary, math, and social sciences as well as social-emotional learning and self-advocacy. 

At Child's Voice, language, listening, and speech skills are at the forefront of all programming.

Growing Opportunities  

Thanks in part to Whole Kids, Child’s Voice was able to add edible and sensory gardens to complement the school’s STREAMM (Science, Technology, Reading, Engineering, Art, Math, and Music) program. With a Whole Kids Garden Grant in 2021, Child's Voice purchased the seeds, plants, dirt, tools, and a hose to facilitate the launch of the sensory and vegetable gardens. They were also able to buy materials to construct benches for the students to stand on when watering the gardens.  

These edible and sensory gardens alongside a preexisting butterfly garden make up the school’s gardening program. Students are able to engage in each garden in distinct ways to expand their language, listening, and speech skills related to gardening, food, nature, and science. Collectively the three gardens work to fulfill the mission of the school’s programming — to optimize listening, speaking, and academic skills.  

From Seeds to Salsa 

Each student had a weekly opportunity to work in and care for the gardens. Students planted and watered the seeds in the classrooms then transferred them outside to raised beds. Then, students contributed to the gardens’ care and maintenance by watering the plants.  

The greater school community and collaborative partners donated their time and talents to help build the raised beds, contributed plants, built benches, and spent hours preparing and later maintaining the gardens.  

The sensory garden featured aromatic herbs like mint and sage, flavorful herbs such as basil and cilantro for students to taste, and touchable plants like plump, firm aloe and soft, velvety lamb’s ear. The edible garden was filled with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, basil, cilantro, lettuce, and more.  

Within the first year of the sensory and vegetable gardens, the school reported several markers of success including: 

  • Growing plants from seeds in the classrooms then transferring them into the garden.  
  • Growing and harvesting enough food to share with students, student's families, and staff.  
  • Sourcing ingredients from the garden to make salsa and bruschetta.  
  • Expanding the students’ vocabulary and language through enriching science experiences.  

Child’s Voice provides students with hearing loss the tools they need to succeed in a hearing world by creating an environment of empathy, care, curiosity, and shared goals. Whole Kids was thrilled to help amplify their efforts with a second Garden Grant in 2024.